|
“I’m in trouble, Sol. I got nowhere else to turn.” Simon Sol Dorsey listened to the recording again, shaking his big, square head. I know I’ve heard that sweet little voice, but I’ll be damned if I can put it to a face or a pair of boobs. Dorsey was one of the best PIs on the west coast, hired by some police agencies to help with high profile crimes, disdained by others, well, because he was Simon Sol Dorsey. He was silly-ass drunk when he stumbled into his Ocean View Drive apartment half an hour ago, which made it about nine in the morning. “I love Friday night,” he said for the third time, trying to rewind the answer machine tape.
“Idiot, this is my new answer machine, all digital or something. No tape to rewind, just play. Like that, see?” and he giggled again. A six-foot-two, two hundred thirty pounder giggling drunk was an interesting sight that few have seen. Put blazing emerald green eyes, a square jaw, and a nose that had been splashed flat more than once, and you would be looking at Sol Dorsey.
Dorsey would best be described as a throwback to the twenties or thirties. The big man grew up on pulp crime magazines, thought once about being a cop but changed his mind as soon as he heard about things like Miranda and perp’s rights. “They got no rights. Bang a head, get an answer,” was a continuing philosophy, which only became an issue when he found himself working for the cops.
It would be easy to say the man didn’t get along with the twenty-first century with one exception, the world of computers. He had a hard time making his cell phone work, but could write computer programs, Simple four-digit home alarm systems throw him curves, low and inside, yet Simon Sol Dorsey fully understood the most complicated computer soft-ware, either on the market, or self-written. Sol Dorsey was an enigma writ large.
He topped out at about six-two when he was still a teenager, and that depended on the boots he was in, and fought his weight with no enthusiasm. “Being in good physical condition is important,” he said once. “I keep as svelte as I am by lifting weights,” and he howled with laughter. His weights came in pint size glasses and were filled with cold beer. Dorsey wore his hair in a flat-top straight out of the fifties, felt more comfortable in jeans, T-shirt, and black leather jacket than suit and tie, and believed strongly that all women should be treated as ladies all the time, regardless of how they made their money.
The section of town that he either hated or loved, depending on whether he was making money from there or spending money because it was there, was Franklyn Street, just two blocks from the commercial docks. A street filled with saloons on both sides. The spaces between the booze palaces were either tattoo parlors or pawnshops, and all the upstairs rooms were rented by the half-hour.
There wasn’t a working girl within fifty miles of the city that didn’t love Simon Sol Dorsey, and he felt the same way about them. He was their favorite uncle, but one that came with special privileges.
~ ~ ~
He found the coffee pot, still had some in it from, when, two days ago? He put it on the stove anyway and plopped into a kitchen chair, pulled a big forty-five revolver out of his shoulder holster, pulled a neat little nine millimeter semi-auto from the inside of his left boot, slipped a knife with a seven inch fixed blade from the sheath on his left side, and punched the recorder again.
“Okay, lady,” he said, “I give up.” He poured the last of the acidic coffee, laced it with the last of the rotgut whiskey, and stared at the machine. “Oh, yeah,” he mumbled, giggled a little bit, and hit the button that said, re-dial. “Damn, I’m one smart sumbitch today,” and waited for someone to answer.
“Sol, Sol, thank you for calling. I’m so scared, please help.” Before he could say anything he heard two quick gunshots, some heavy footsteps, and a gruff voice said, “Keep out of this Dorsey if you know what’s good for you,” and the line went dead.
“Sober-up time,” Dorsey snarled, quickly made a pot of strong coffee and went to work to find out who the woman was. When he hit re-dial he hadn’t looked for a number to be displayed, and this time he did, jotted it down quickly, and opened his computer, found his address book, and queried that number.
“Whatdya mean it ain’t there?” he said. “She called me by name, knows me well enough to know I would respond to a call for help, but I have never called her or know her well enough to put her in my little black book?” Coffee boiled over and he poured some, turned the heat down, and sat back down. “A little reverse help here,” he muttered, stroking some keys on the computer, watching the little wheel spin for a minute, and then the name Monica P. Fetterman splashed onto the screen.
Dorsey was known far and wide as one who spent more time talking to himself than he did to real people, and he was proving it this morning. “We sure got a long way there. Who the hell is Monica P. Fetterman, or maybe, who was ole Monica?” He called the name up on Google and there she was, Starr Baby, being arrested by the local dicks last year in a raid on a convention of men wearing animal horns on their hats.
“So that’s your name,” he muttered. A few more minutes on the computer, found the address where the telephone service was, and Dorsey made a quick phone call before heading out the door. “Stupid sumbitch,” he snarled, went back in and shut off the stove. “I’ll burn myself right out of here, someday,” he halfway chuckled as he moved his monster ’56 Caddy convertible through traffic, stopping at an apartment complex in one of the city’s rougher neighborhoods.
“Glad I remembered the guns,” he smiled, looking up and down the empty block in front of the complex. The gutters and sidewalks were filled with trash and garbage, paper products flew about in the wind, and the air was not filled with the warmth and love of a Pacific Ocean breeze. Of the cars parked on that block, most were without wheels, some without doors, and none had all their windows.
“Starr Baby shouldn’t live in this kind of neighborhood,” he muttered, kicking some trash aside. He watched a black Crown Vic squeal to a stop and Detective Captain Ulysses S. (Serious) Elmo stepped out. Two squad cars pulled in behind him. It was Saturday morning, three cop cars parked all crooked, no reds and blues flashing their warnings, and the passerby simply passed on by. “Must be the neighborhood,” Dorsey snarled. |
